


Of Secrets, Fate, and First Meetings

by Remy (iamremy)



Category: Mission: Impossible (Movies), Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011)
Genre: Alcohol, Banter, Drinking & Talking, Drinking to Cope, Eventual Romance, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-03
Updated: 2015-09-03
Packaged: 2018-04-18 21:44:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4721576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iamremy/pseuds/Remy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ethan is good at remembering faces. Will is good at making himself forgettable.</p>
<p>They meet for the first time in a dusty bar in Croatia.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Secrets, Fate, and First Meetings

**Author's Note:**

> Set approximately a week after the shitfest that went down in Croatia. It didn't come to me as an idea so much as a series of sentences begging to be written, and I honestly could not rest till I had it all down.
> 
> I enjoyed writing it, and for once the title is somewhat original! I hope you guys like it too.

**Of Secrets, Fate, and F** **ir** **st** **Meetings** **  
**~remy

* * *

Ethan has to take a moment to adjust his eyes to the dim, smoky atmosphere of the _Pušenje Pištolj_ right after the late-afternoon sunlight he’s just entered from. The bar is not very large, but is already beginning to look crowded due to people slowly trickling in after a day at work. Ethan notices none of them and all of them at once as he makes his way towards the counter. It must be something in his eyes, since his expression is carefully neutral - everyone makes way for him to pass without comment.

The stool at the bar looks rickety and fragile, and Ethan has absolutely no idea if it will support his weight at all, but he goes ahead and sits anyway. He figures that if - when - it shows signs of falling apart, he’ll just hop off and find another one. The bartender, a tall, well-built lady in her late thirties with cold green eyes and curly red hair, stops wiping the countertop and comes to a stand in front of him, not saying anything, just looking at him expectantly.

“Vodka,” he tells her. It’s a time for the strong stuff, now.

She nods and goes about getting it, looking completely unfazed at a man walking in and ordering hard liquor when it’s not even dark outside, and not even starting off with beer or something less strong. Ethan wonders for a moment about the stories she must have listened to, over the years.

There are a few men and women eyeing him from across the bar, he notices without having to look. None of them approach, though, probably because of the stiff set of his shoulders and the hard line of his back. There is music playing from the overhead speakers, a song in a language he cannot understand, and so he pays it no mind. It’s not bothering him anyway, though if someone gets up to do karaoke then maybe he’ll do something about _that_.

The bartender sets down his vodka in front of him and he begins to drink, deliberately not paying mind to the little voice in his head that’s consistently and annoyingly telling him that he hasn’t had anything to drink in forever and now probably isn’t a good time to start. He’s just lost his wife. When, if not now, would be a good time, then?

* * *

He’s been seated there for half an hour without any interruptions, feeling slightly buzzed, when a man slides into the stool next to his. Ethan takes in the stranger without turning his head and giving away that he’s watching him, an art he’s perfected over the years. The man looks to be around the same height as Ethan, and well-built under the plain black shirt and faded blue jeans he’s wearing. He’s got hair so dark blonde that Ethan would have mistook it for brown if he hadn’t seen the way it glinted in the dim lights of the bar, and skin that’s definitely sun-kissed but not what he’d call tanned. He can’t see the stranger’s eyes without turning though, so he waits for a better opportunity.

All of this he does absently, even unconsciously. People-watching is a habit he’s cultivated from years of observing everyone around him, whether on a mission or otherwise, taking in things like their expressions, their gait, the way they talk… body language is, after all, one of the best ways to know someone without saying a word to them. He used to do it just on missions, before. Then he began doing it in his time off as well, especially after coming to Croatia, just to assure himself that no one around him was acting suspicious or was possibly after them.

Now she’s gone and he’s pretty much anonymous in this country right now, but he can’t stop himself from doing it all the same. He prides himself on his ability to remember faces and people in great detail; it’s come in handy on missions many, many times, and he has no doubt that it will continue to do so in the future. It keeps him a step ahead of everyone, and that is nothing if not an advantage.

Right now Ethan keeps on watching the stranger, due to this habit of his but also because he’s wondering why the man would choose to sit next to him in a bar that has plenty of empty spaces.

The stranger orders a beer in perfect, slightly accented Croatian. A foreigner, then. The bartender nods at him and gets busy, and the man uses that time to sigh, long and slow, and his shoulders slump forward as he rests his elbows on the table and his chin on his forearms. To Ethan it looks like the weight of the world is on this man’s shoulders, and he finds himself wondering what it could be. Then he tells himself to get a grip; a stranger’s problems are hardly his business.

There’s something about the stranger, though. When his beer arrives he thanks the bartender with a smile that’s almost unconscious, like he doesn’t at all realize he’s doing it, like he’s been smiling at strangers for so long that it comes to him automatically now. Very few people do that anymore, just smile and thank someone like that, like they’re genuinely grateful, and Ethan finds himself wondering about the kind of man this stranger was raised to be.

His fingers are long, almost delicate, like a musician’s or an artist’s, but Ethan can see calluses on the inside in places that he knows come from guns and knives and working yourself to the bone to distract yourself from your own mind, to lose yourself in the art of perfecting something just so you have something to do. He’s no stranger to it.

So the man is someone like him, at least in that respect. Ethan wonders if he’s an agent for some organization, or just in law enforcement. He’s just opened his mouth to make small talk and find out when the man looks up at him, and his voice dies in his throat.

The man has got the most striking eyes Ethan has ever seen on anybody. It’s not even that they’re an unusual color or exotic or anything like that - in fact they’re just blue. But then saying _just blue_ would be a great injustice, Ethan feels, to their depth, their brightness, and the way they’re framed by long eyelashes which instead of making him look delicate or fragile just somehow add to his analytical gaze, the way he’s reading Ethan just as much as Ethan’s reading him.

“Hello,” the stranger says, his voice low.

“Hello,” Ethan replies, nonplussed.

“You’re watching me. Why?”

Taken aback but not letting it show, Ethan asks, “What do you mean?” even though he knows perfectly well what he means. It’s just that it’s the first time he’s gotten caught, and then confronted in such a direct manner.

The stranger’s eyes narrow just a little bit, a crease appearing between his eyebrows. “I mean exactly what I said,” he says, voice still low. “Why are you watching me?”

“I guess I’m wondering why you’re here in this particular spot when there are plenty of other empty places,” Ethan replies. Two can play at this game.

“Same reason you’re watching me,” the stranger tells him.

“And what would that reason be?” inquires Ethan, smooth as silk, appearing unfazed even though he can’t stop thinking, _who is this guy?_

The stranger shrugs, a gesture that appears casual but is calculated, just like everything coming out of the stranger’s mouth. Ethan sits up a little straighter. This guy is _fascinating_ , a challenge. A puzzle, if Ethan can be bothered solving it.

“You’re American, right?” he asks, instead of asking him to elaborate what the shrug means (he has a feeling that he won’t get the answer to that in any straightforward terms).

The stranger nods. “And so are you,” he states.

Ethan nods. “What a coincidence that the two of us should meet here, in a no-name bar in a foreign country instead of back home.”

The stranger opens his mouth to reply, but before he can do so the bartender sweeps into the space between them and says, her voice rough, “Not a no-name bar. It is called _Pušenje Pištolj_. Means-”

“Smoking Gun,” the stranger finishes. “Creative.”

“Thank you,” she replies with a nod, clearly choosing to ignore the sarcasm. Ethan can only hope this doesn’t mean she’s going to overcharge both of them for their drinks.

“And no, it’s less of a coincidence than if we met back home,” the stranger says, turning back to Ethan. “We could be from opposite ends of the country and maybe we never would have met if not here.”

“Maybe,” concedes Ethan. “Then again, maybe not. People who are destined to meet can meet anywhere.”

He’s expecting the stranger to counter him like he’s been doing, keep their little game going, but the man just quirks his lips into a not-quite smile that looks more bitter than anything else, and says, “True.”

When he doesn’t go on, Ethan asks, “So what brings you here?”

“A strong need for a drink,” is the immediate reply, and Ethan almost smiles to himself. Back to the game, then.

“A drink can be gotten from any department store and drunk at home.”

“And yet there’s nothing quite like a drink in a bar, which is why you are also here.”

“However I could also be here because I am waiting for someone.”

“And if you were, you would be seated at the tables that, as you so astutely pointed out to me, are empty.”

Ethan hides a grin into his vodka. This guy is _good_. Ethan’s actually kind of enjoying this now; it’s a much better way to get his mind off his problems. Not that he’s going to stop drinking now - at some point the stranger will leave and he’ll begin ruminating on his problems again.

He’s not surprised to find he doesn’t want the stranger to leave. It’s nice to have someone to talk to, someone who doesn’t know him and isn’t immediately going to ask “are you okay?” because honestly, he is _sick_ of that question (whether uttered over the phone, via text or in person) and it hasn’t even been a full week yet.

“All right,” Ethan finally says. “Let me rephrase. Why do you feel a strong need for a drink in a bar?”

“It’s much better than a strong need for a drink at home,” is the maddeningly smooth reply, and Ethan would think that the stranger must be enjoying the game as much as he is, but he still looks weary and tense, and he is not smiling.

“Why a strong need for a drink at all?”

“It’s a better idea than the alternative.”

“Which is?”

The stranger raises an eyebrow at him. “If I wanted to answer questions about my personal life I would go to a therapist, not a bar.”

“Sometimes they are the same thing.”

“And sometimes, the opposite of each other.”

“Point noted.” Ethan orders another vodka. The stranger’s beer is practically untouched.

The bartender swoops down between them again, her long red hair forming a curtain that blocks off the stranger’s face. “We can do therapy as well,” she informs them. “For an extra ten per drink. Cheaper than a doctor.”

“Um, no thanks,” Ethan hears the stranger say. “I’m good.”

“The service is there if you wish,” the bartender tells him.

“No, really, thank you.” Ethan can hear the smile in the stranger’s voice, which has remained low all this time, like he doesn’t want anyone to be able to hear how it truly sounds. Ethan can’t help but wonder as well - what does this man sound like when he’s not having a bad day? When he’s laughing? When he’s talking without effort?

He gives himself a mental shake. The stranger is just that - a stranger. In a while they’re both going to go their separate ways, and never see each other again. He does _not_ need to know all the sordid details of this person’s life, doesn’t need to hear him talk properly or laugh or any of those things. It’s not going to matter anyway, not even if he does end up exchange numbers with the guy or whatever. He’s not sure anything or anyone can even fill the gap left behind by Julia.

The bartender goes back to whatever she was doing, and the stranger snorts into his full glass of beer. “Extra ten per drink for therapy. I’m almost too afraid to ask.”

“She’s probably going to tell you to suck it up, whatever it is,” Ethan adds, half-smiling, and hoping somewhere in the back of his mind that the stranger will return it.

He doesn’t. Instead his mouth seems to pull lower at the corners, his posture tensing and then slumping, like he’s had to force his muscles to relax. His shirt’s black, too dark for Ethan to be able to see the shape of his muscles under it, but he can tell that the guy is well-built, strong shoulders and arms and slim waist, and legs that look like he could crush someone’s skull between his thighs. Again, Ethan wonders what exactly this guy does for a living. His physique is not the kind attainable just by working out at the gym - it speaks of years of exerting himself, working out, taking his body to the limits just to test how much it could take.

Exactly like Ethan himself. Takes one to know one, after all.

“My problem isn’t the kind you can suck up,” the man admits, his head hanging so Ethan can’t see his expression, just the side of his face. “I… I fucked up. At work. I fucked up _bad_.”

Ethan doesn’t say anything, because if he does then maybe the guy will stop talking, and Ethan doesn’t want that. He can tell himself it’s irrational all he wants, but the truth is that he wants to know more, wants to know why this guy is sitting like someone just ruined his entire world for him.

But then he spots the guy’s face, the absolute misery on it, and he can’t help himself. “I’m sure it can’t be that bad.”

“It _is_ ,” the guy insists. “I mean, like - y’know. When you know something is going to go to shit and you should stop it, but you don’t for whatever reason, and then it does go to shit and you can’t stop blaming yourself?”

Ethan thinks of Julia, and swallows down the lump that’s made itself known in his throat. “Yeah,” he says quietly. “I know.”

The man lets out his breath through his lips. “And it feels like no matter what you do, you can’t make up for it.”

“Believe it or not… yeah.”

“Why?” The guy lets out a dry, mirthless laugh, and this is the exact opposite of the kind of laugh Ethan wants to hear. “You fuck up something too?” He looks like he already knows the answer, though, and Ethan thinks maybe it shows on his face.

He swallows again. “Yeah. I did. That’s why I’m here.”

“What a coincidence. Again.”

Ethan finishes his drink, signals to the bartender for another. His head is beginning to feel heavy now, and his thought process is slower, murkier, more jumbled up. That’s probably why he’s feeling more concern and curiosity about this stranger - perhaps, if he’d been sober, this conversation might never have got this far. Ethan’s not sure how he feels about that.

“Does it feel like it’s going to be all right?” asks the stranger. Not like he’s mocking Ethan or his problems, but like he’s genuinely curious. It’s a bit hard to tell because of how low his voice is - just barely louder than the music and general rush of talking in the bar, really - but Ethan may or may not have leaned in a couple of inches closer to him. Maybe.

“I don’t know,” he answers honestly, taking a sip of the drink that’s just arrived. “Maybe because it hasn’t been that long since it happened. But I guess life goes on.”

“Yeah, guess life goes on,” echoes the stranger.

There is a short silence that by all means should be awkward and uncomfortable but really isn’t. Ethan knows that now would be a good time to stop drinking and go home, before he gets utterly wasted and says something he shouldn’t, but there’s a voice inside his head that’s telling him that he deserves a break. Besides, he’s a seasoned agent, he can trust himself not to lose control, right? He’s not had _that_ much to drink.

Ethan’s drink is half-finished by the time the stranger speaks again. He’s been sipping at his own beer during the silence, but has barely made a dent in it - there’s still more than three-quarters of the glass left. “You come here a lot?”

Ethan shakes his head. “No. In fact I haven’t had a drink in quite a while.”

The stranger nods. “Yeah, same. I don’t usually like the taste, truth be told.” He grimaces down at his beer to prove his point.

“I actually hate the idea of losing control,” Ethan tells him. Why did he tell him that?

“Yeah,” mutters the man. “Though that’s definitely where you’re headed right now.”

Ethan shrugs, the small movement sloppier than he’d like it to. Damn, the stranger’s right. “Well, sometimes you just have to.”

“Guess that’s also true,” the stranger concedes. He pushes his beer away with one hand and stands, laying down some cash on the old, scratched and splintery wooden counter. “I should head out now,” he says to Ethan, stuffing his hands in his pocket. “I never meant to sit that long.”

“It’s not been that long,” Ethan protests, and then wonders why he’s doing it. He understands that a lot of time without has probably lessened his tolerance for alcohol, but to this extent? Shit.

The stranger quirks a smile that actually looks genuine, but it’s gone before Ethan can take a proper look. “It’s been long enough,” he says. “Been… nice, I guess, talking to you.”

“Yeah, same to you,” Ethan says. He really doesn’t want the guy to leave, at least not for a while longer (maybe he could even get him to laugh, he knows he can be funny when he wants to), but he’s not drunk enough to say _that_ much.

“Don’t drink too much,” the stranger says with a small snort. “Wouldn’t want to lose control, you know, not with the kind of job you have.”

And then he’s gone before Ethan can say anything. Ethan’s too busy watching him leave to register his last comment. It only comes back to him much later, when the man is probably long gone and unlikely to ever run into Ethan again.

He frowns into his drink. He’s never seen the guy before. He’s definitely not IMF, or Ethan would have seen him around. It was probably just a nonchalant comment that Ethan is taking the wrong way, because he’s naturally somewhat paranoid, and also he’s grieving and drunk and way more fascinated by the stranger than he should be.

He really wishes he could have heard him laugh, though.

* * *

Ethan wakes up in his small hotel room the next morning with a terrible fucking hangover and the haziest memories of the previous night. He remembers that he talked to a guy who’d left earlier than Ethan had wanted him to, and that he’d managed to stumble to his room late into the night after footing a hefty bill at the bar, but nothing beyond that.

Somehow he feels the space in his mind where the memory should be a bit more sharply than he has any right to.

* * *

He does get to hear the stranger - although he ceases to be that - laugh, but not soon after that night at the bar. He hears it years later, after running into the man again in Moscow of all places, and then Dubai, and then Mumbai, where the space in his mind is filled abruptly, almost dizzyingly, when he looks up the man’s file (and really, they’ve got to stop all of this meeting abroad instead of back home business). He learns the man’s name - first it’s William Brandt, Chief Analyst (which explains why Ethan hasn’t seen him around before then); then it’s Brandt, field agent, quiet, reserved, calculating, sharp as a knife and smarter than anyone Ethan’s ever met; and then, finally, it’s Will, sarcastic, funny, thoughtful, sweet, and still the smartest person Ethan knows, and also the most beautiful.

He learns the man’s - Will’s - secrets, and his thoughts and feelings and what makes him tick. He learns his strengths and weaknesses, both physical and emotional, and he learns that Will is perhaps the only person he knows who can see through his mental shields in a second, who knows without asking what he needs at any give moment. He memorizes Will’s smile and his laugh, and the sensation of his skin against Ethan’s, the touch of his lips and his hands, and his voice when he’s happy and when he’s sad and everything in between.

And in return he gives all of himself to Will.

(The hole Julia’s left behind heals soon after.)

* * *

It’s well after midnight, more than a year after their second first meeting in Moscow - Will appears to be asleep, curled up next to Ethan and facing him, long eyelashes touching his cheeks, but when Ethan leans in and whispers “People who are destined to meet can meet anywhere” against his lips, he opens blue, blue eyes and smiles into the kiss.

 

**Author's Note:**

> So what did you guys think? Feedback and all screaming about the new movie can be directed to me in the comments :)
> 
> [my tumblr.](chesterbennington.co.vu)
> 
> Love,  
> Remy x


End file.
